I have grown so accustomed to waking up to the neighborhood roosters that I have a fear alarm clocks won’t do their job for me anymore. I stayed in bed until seven and had a nice slow morning with my bowl of Frosties and partially skimmed milk. As I was getting my things together I remembered it was Wednesday, that it was staff meeting morning, and that they have started locking the doors on people who are even just a few minutes late. So my pace picked up a bit as I hurried to get down to the Clinic on time and not have to face the embarrassment of needing the door unlocked for poor Cait. I made it in the door at precisely 8:00 and enjoyed another time of staff meeting. Today’s topics of concern were not turning off the lights when leaving the room, yelling out “Old School!” in public instead of referring to Dr. Onyijiaka by his actual name, and a disheartening note someone tacked on the bulletin board stating that Faith Alive needs to “Wake Up” during this “dark time.” People here are very superstitious and a few on staff believe that Hannatu’s death was caused by a curse someone put on social services or because God was punishing this gentile woman and her coworkers for their sins. I’m glad Dr. Chris is doing his best to fight against some of the deeply rooted myths here.
There was not much to do in the pharmacy right away so I had a good chat with the new pharmacist (and new next-door neighbor) named David. He’s a really neat guy with a lot of knowledge of world politics, geography, and culture. We spoke of our political beliefs (the first Nigerian Democrat I have talked to) and had a lively conversation about what we perceived as good music. We could agree on the Beatles and U2, but I was not so sure I thought Whitney Houston and Diana Ross deserved as much praise as he was giving them. At least it gave us a chance to sing out our soul-sister hits. Once patients started coming in for drugs we had to get to work so I went on counting pills and sorting medicine. Isaiah and I have discovered that we make a pretty good counting team and I taught Tima a little bit of Spanish so it was a successful morning.
Lunch was followed by an unexpected power nap (I shouldn’t sit on my bed to read in the afternoons) before going back to work. Adrie had spent all morning with The Book so she came hoping to get a little internet time in. After five minutes of being back she found out the internet was down and two minutes after that the thunder started to rumble. Jon and Kristen let me talk to Uncle Thomas with them about starting a rotation system for morning devotionals and the three of us got some good feedback from the man who is always stuck speaking before the Clinic opens. We spent the next good while brainstorming a calendar, list of topics, and department understanding. Hopefully that will work out so the three Pastors (Ben, Thomas, and Esther) won’t always been expected to give the morning message. It was still pouring when our proposal was put together so we watched our music videos (they get increasingly lamer with every play) and talked about what going home is looking like for them. Joshua came back around 4:30 and figured out the power/internet problem so we were able to watch a couple SNL videos on Youtube before Greg came with the van to drive us home.
Baba made my favorite dinner tonight (chicken, rice, pineapple, and fried plantains), which made me incredibly happy. We wandered into the living room where conversation turned to driving tests and getting arrested. I honestly believe we have covered every topic possible to speak of over the past five weeks. Tonight we all learned a) Not to bring a squirt gun into Target, b) Never to be drunk on campus (especially in Harrisonburg, Virginia), c) Crying will help you pass your driver’s test, and d) Kicking your brake lights will help them turn on. Oh the wisdom we are all reaping! Kristen joined our trio for late-night pilates, which nearly made us pass out, and we decided we were too full and too tired to attempt anything else for the rest of the night. Off to bed!
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